Thinking of bringing your retail operation online? Take a page from small and big grocery stores and proceed cautiously.
Curt Altpeter, executive vice president of MyWebGrocer.com in Burlington, Vt., said his company focuses exclusively on grocery stores from the large chains like Shop Rite to the smaller, independent chains like Geissler’s Supermarkets, based in East Windsor, that has seven locations in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
He said now is a prime time for smaller grocery stores and chains to consider going into the online business because Amazon is setting its sights on the grocery business. It can’t deliver fresh produce like fruit and meat, yet, but it can do everything else. Other companies like Peapod have been delivering food from Stop & Shop for years but this would be the first national approach to home delivery.
“It’s a market that is here to stay but consumer adoption has taken longer,” Altpeter added.
Smaller retailers benefit from going to a “soup-to-nuts” approach, Altpeter said, because their expertise isn’t in online technology. Jim Nilsson, president of Geissler’s Supermarkets, said going to a turnkey operation like MyWebGrocer, made sense for his operation because his team knows how to sell wares, not run a website.
“The advantage is that the investment in software and equipment, as well as personnel to run it, is done by MyWebGrocer. And we can offer the delivery of goods and selections on the Web just like the ‘big guys.’ Our customers like the time savings it offers, such as pre-loading your shopping list. With these services, our customers can stay with us and do not have to go to the competition for better digital service,” said Nilsson.
The best move for a small retailers is to leverage their “brick and mortar stores they’ve already built and build that digitally,” Altpeter said. There is no need advantage to start from scratch.
Altpeter said small retailers like grocers have one advantage other businesses don’t when it comes to launching a website: content. He said grocery stores are used to producing weekly flyers and those flyers are the number one reason consumers head to a grocer’s website. “They’re used to being a content provider,” he said. “They don’t have to pay for content to be created.”
Small retailers also shouldn’t feel the need to have to create their website’s content. Altpeter recommends a partnership with a content provider like a freelance writer with expertise in the field. He also said, in the case of grocery stores, there are “thousands of providers for recipes,” which could create instant depth of content for a website.
Nilsson has practical advice for small grocery stores starting a website. “Speaking to store owners, I would advise them to keep their items list up to date and commit to maintenance, to keep it true and fresh. Select one store and use their file for all stores. Marketing of what you are offering is also very important to get the word out to all of your customers, as well as the potential new customers,” he said.
Altpeter has additional advice for grocery stores: go slow. Don’t attempt to build an entire website from scratch. Get the basics down and then branch out from there into areas like social media and email.
“It’s hard to get into social media without building the foundation,” he said. “It’s an incremental process that you build out.”
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Consumer snapshot
Results from PriceGrabber’s 2012 Shopping Outlook survey found that more than 51 percent of consumers plan to spend the same amount of money in 2012 as in the previous year. Other key findings from the survey include:
• 21 percent of consumers will spend more than last year;
• 8 percent will spend less than last year;
• Shoppers spending more cited better discounts, confidence in economy as reasons;
• More than 50 percent of consumers will spend more on consumer electronics and clothing;
• 46 percent will use daily deal sites more often;
• 45 percent will combine online, brick-and-mortar and mobile shopping.
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This spuds’ for you
Sonic, which has locations in Wallingford and Manchester among other spots in Connecticut, has a new menu item for a limited time: Sweet Potato Tots. In a news release, Sonic said USDA Economic Research Service shows that sweet potato U.S. per capita consumption has been on the rise, even as white potato consumption has slowed.
“As a result, it looks like the unsung spud is finally getting its due and feeling the love beyond the Thanksgiving dinner table,” the release proclaimed.
